Firefight
by AdInventum
Summary: Suddenly it's so much simpler when you realize your whole life is just a game. The Reach characters and a few familiar faces discover sentience and a whole new world of adventure. Read and review please.


"So. Remind me whose brilliant idea this was again?"

Emile punctuated his question with a blast from his shotgun, gutting a Grunt that had actually been running _away_. He then turned and assassinated the other fleeing Grunt, snapping its neck and throwing the body aside.

"I think it was Kat's. Or Cortana's. They fight over who gets to tweak with the settings," Noble Six told him, scanning the area for more threats through the scope of her DMR. "Looks clear. We should head back into the building- these guys appear out of nowhere."

"Leave it to Cortana to disable the dropships," Emile groaned, following Six up the hill.

They went in the back way and made a beeline for the ammo refill station. While Emile was shoving more shells into his shotgun, he continued to gripe. "And what's her deal, anyway? I mean, it doesn't even have to be _bottomless clip_, just regular ole' infinite ammo. I guess she likes running back and forth to this stupid thing."

"She's just trying to make it fair for the AI," Six reminded him.

She left Emile to his complaining and went up to the roof, where Jun was stationed. When she saw nothing there, she cleared her throat and tapped a finger against the railing. "You can show yourself to me, you know," she said dryly.

There was a slight blur, then the faintest outline of a green-armored Spartan with a sniper rifle. Then he was invisible again. "Not taking any chances. Especially after last time. There were seven of them. _Seven_. And they all had fuel rod guns." There was a tremor of dread in his voice.

"At least look through your scope and tell me what John and Jorge are doing," Six said. "I keep hearing explosions, but I haven't been able to make my way over there yet. Too many tangos hiding out in the middle."

There was a pause, a slight blur as Jun turned toward her. "They're having some kind of Spartan-II kill festival. Can't really see over all the dead bodies."

"Figured as much," Six sighed. She went toward the stairs. "See ya round."

His reply was a sharp crack as he sniped some poor Grunt through the head. "Yep."

_Meanwhile, on the other side of the battlefield..._

"Gotcha!"

Cortana ran past the still-twitching bodies of the Grunts she'd shot, switching from Magnum to assault rifle as she went. She had on a Mark VI helmet and an ice/lavender color scheme. Also, her head was wreathed in blue flames. Since this was an offline game, no one would know about her "leet hax," and she was perfectly content to flaunt her skills unabashedly. She fired at an incoming squad, a continuous onslaught of rounds felling them in seconds. The fact that no one had set bottomless clip for this round was irrelevant. When it came to Firefight and custom games, Cortana was a deity.

She rounded a corner and skidded to a halt. There were hundreds of dead bodies here, still fresh- the game hadn't deleted them yet. And sure enough, two sage-armored Spartans were going at it in the center of the field, having made the destroyed Wraith tank their "base." One had a turret gun, the other had an MA5B, something that shouldn't even be in this game. Cortana smirked beneath her helmet. Noble Team could keep its Army weapons. Her John was going to get exactly what he wanted if she could help it.

"I think we've run out," Jorge remarked, seeing that there was nothing left to kill.

"There'll be more," John grunted.

_"REINFORCEMENTS!"_ announced the disembodied voice that had been saying random things like "Overkill!" and "Untouchable!" this entire time.

Seconds later, a mass of Grunts just _appeared_ on the grass.

A loud crack rang out, and two of the Grunts fell dead at one time. "I'm assuming that was your sniper," John mused, spraying rounds at the incoming horde. _"Double kill!" _The Voice said in a satisfied tone.

"Oh look, your girlfriend's head's on fire," Jorge said in a bored tone. His turret ran out of ammo, so he whipped out the rocket launcher that had been clinging to his back. "Might want to stand back, this thing tends to teamkill."

John turned to see Cortana heading toward him.

"Fashion statement?" he asked, indicating her flaming helmet.

"I think it's a great intimidation factor," Cortana replied cheerily.

There was a thunderous volley of sound accompanied by bright flashes of light as rockets decimated the Grunt population.

**A/N: This is just a fragment of something much larger, I'm having writer's block so until I get the rest up here, just tell me what ya'll think.**


End file.
